Upper Limits on the Neutrino Mass from the Tritium Beta Spectrum

Abstract

The shape of the tritium beta spectrum near the end point has been investigated in a spherical electrostatic integral spectrograph with particular reference to the possible effects of a nonzero neutrino mass. It is shown that the source thickness of 100 micrograms/${\mathrm{cm}}^2$ may be satisfactorily taken into account in the last kilovolt of the spectrum, upon which the results are based. An upper limit to the neutrino mass of 500, 250, and 150 electron volts is found for the Dirac, Majorana, and Fermi forms, respectively, of the beta interaction.